


Merpeople, What?

by pherryt



Series: New Clint Barton Bingo [16]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Confessions, Explosions, First Kiss, Fluff, Giant Squid - Freeform, Helplessness, Kidnapping, M/M, Magic, Merpeople, Misconceptions, Nerd!Bucky, Nightmares, Rescue Mission, Underwater, except bucky and clint, merfolk, presumed death but not, the whole team knows, worried!bucky
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-04
Updated: 2020-07-04
Packaged: 2021-03-04 23:01:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,825
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25074298
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pherryt/pseuds/pherryt
Summary: Tony has to go down to his underwater station and figure out why no one wants to stay. A few of the Avengers come along for the ride. Things go downhill from there.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Clint Barton, Winterhawk
Series: New Clint Barton Bingo [16]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1540606
Comments: 12
Kudos: 75





	Merpeople, What?

**Author's Note:**

> For the Clint Bingo Square O3; "I'm Sorry, he's gone"
> 
> Using some rolls off the different trope rollers from one of the discords to help flesh it out.

“He’s gone, Buck! Bucky! Bucky, stop! I’m sorry, but he’s gone!”

Steve had Bucky by the shoulders and was yelling as Bucky fought to get past him. He didn’t want to hurt Steve, he didn’t, but _Clint –_

_Clint – oh my god…_

_Clint_ was _gone._

Bucky fell to his knees, keening, dragging Steve down with him.

“I know, buddy, I know, but you need to calm down or we won’t be able to figure out what happened and _help_ him,” Steve insisted.

“Help him? How can we help him _now?”_ Bucky choked out. “We’re in an underwater tin can, Steve. That explosion blew him out the airlock. He had no suit on. _Steve!”_ Bucky pitched forward and clutched at Steve’s uniform and sobbed. “He had no _suit_ on.”

“Neither do you, Buck, and you were about to shove out there after him!” Steve bit out. “You can’t _do_ that to us.”

Bucky’s ear piece crackled – the depth they were at was playing havoc with all their equipment but most especially that of their comms – and Nat’s voice sounded.

“Tony’s got a line on Clint’s position. He’s 3 clicks south of our position and moving fast. Also, his vitals are good.”

Bucky’s head jerked up. “What? How?” Had the explosion blown Cint that far? Shouldn’t the water have slowed him down? And… had she said…? “He’s alive?”

“For now,” she said. There was a pause and a much softer. “Don’t do anything stupid, Bucky.”

“How can I?” Bucky sagged, falling away from Steve, back fetching up against the cool steel of the blasted corridor and rubbing a hand over his face. “I just _lost_ the stupid.”

“We’ll get him back, Buck,” Steve said, sympathy and determination filling his voice. “Alive. I promise.”

* * *

Well.

This looked bad.

Clint was rocketing away from the underwater station at a scarily consistent speed. And he could breathe. What the fuck was up with that?

Okay, so it looked bad, but it could be worse. He could already be dead from the explosion, or dying from lack of oxygen. Since neither of those things were happening, he was going to count it as a mark in the win column.

Now if only he had _any_ clue _how_ he wasn’t dead, that would be nice.

New super power? Nah, if he was a mutant, the SHIELD tests would have picked up on that. Or Reeds. Oh, maybe he’d been exposed to some sort of radiation like Banner or the Fantastic Four? Though, breathing underwater didn’t seem to be an ability that would lend itself to a lot of super heroe-ing (was that even a word? Oh, who cared), at least it was keeping him alive, right?

Clint blinked and noticed that… he was _turning?_

He twisted about to look behind him and started choking. He whipped his head back around again to face front as he suddenly dipped and swerved around… around nothing, but heading now straight for an underwater cliff. The choking stopped when he righted himself – so probably not a super power but something was _definitely_ going on - but now Clint was bracing himself for impact –

Only nothing happened.

He passed right through the cliff wall like it wasn’t even there, an entire world of color and light blooming before his eyes. Towering spires in shapes that could never have been built on land, schools of brightly colored fish, in all shapes and sizes swimming around him.

He was so busy looking at the kaleidoscope spreading out around him, that it took him a few minutes to pull a few shapes away from the mass and realize what he was seeing – _mermaids!_

Escorting him along his invisible road – a current, Clint would guess, and a real strong one too – were a handful of merpeople – men and women (and who knew what else) alike. All shapes and sizes and colors, patterns and tails. Some were the more traditional style of merpeople one had come to expect from media, and others had fins like a ray, or tails like a shark. Some had tentacles – both of the octopi or squid style and also the style of… a jelly fish? It was so ethereal and Clint hadn’t really expected it.

It was gorgeous, except for the fact that Clint _didn’t_ miss the weapons in their hands, or at their sides. Spears and tridents and swords. Blades that had that strange gleaming quality Clint had gotten used to seeing on Bucky’s arm.

Jesus.

Merpeople with Vibranium and cloaking technology? What were they, the Wakandans of the sea? Wait, could they be?

“Hey, where are you taking me?” Clint called out. “I’m Clint. I think there’s been some sort of misunderstanding.”

The merpeople didn’t answer him, but that didn’t deter Clint from trying again. It was possible they didn’t speak his language, but it was equally possible they just didn’t want to talk.

Okay, the former was more likely than the latter, Clint had to admit. After all, no matter how advanced their underwater society, how many humans could the merpeople have had any contact with, down here this deep?

The current dragging him along slowed and tilted, dropping him on a broad shelf before a grand, intricately carved archway. He stared at it, till he was prodded by one of the floating merpeople.

“Hey, all you had to do was ask,” Clint said, stepping forward awkwardly, his limbs moving like jelly, pushing against the water with – with a lot less resistance then one would think, down this deep, but resistance, nonetheless. Every step kept floating him up, and leaving him flailing for the ground. It took him a bit to get used to how to move underwater the right way when oxygen didn’t seem to be an issue. “Once more unto the arch,” he muttered more softly to himself. Man, he wished the comms were still working. He bet Bucky would have laughed at that. He’d have grumbled and complained about how horrible it was, but Clint had gotten used to picking out the notes in Bucky’s voice, the hidden laughter under his other tones, despite Clint’s worsening ears.

That was another thing.

This underwater realm was too quiet, too unsettling. The movement of the water around him was more pressure than actual noise, the ocean seeming to keep clear of his ears as well as his nose and mouth. And his eyes, he realized, when he thought suddenly how they should be stinging in the salt of the ocean.

But they weren’t.

Whatever was keeping him breathing was helping him in other ways. He wasn’t sure if his comfort was a side affect of keeping him alive – for what, for sport? For parlay? First contact? – or if was intentional, but he wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

Or should that be a gift octopus?

* * *

“Tampering,” Tony said. “This airlock was _tampered_ with. It was a goddamned _trap._ Whoever took Barton _planned_ this. It’s probably why he’s still alive. I just wish the coms were working. Explosion took them out, but at least his tracker still functions. We’ll have to go around to another airlock. I’ve already remote moved the sub, we just have to head over.”

“Who would tamper with the airlock?” Steve asked. “And why strike now, when we’ve been here for days?”

“Good questions, Cap. What do you say we find out?” Tony said. “Everybody, suit up. We can’t count on Barton’s luck happening a second time. Bucky –“

“I’ll load Clint’s suit on the sub,” Bucky said, already heading down the corridor.

This mission had been simple. A cakewalk. They hadn’t even needed the whole team. Or any of the others that occasionally helped out. It’d just been the five of them – Stark, Steve, Nat, Clint and Bucky – bringing the newly built Stark station online. The workers had all left before the little group had gotten there, complaining of bad dreams and weird noises.

Stark had blown it off, and the team had come along – mostly for the ride. Bucky had always been a geek at heart, despite not knowing the word until he’d come back from being the Winter Soldier, and there’d been no way he’d have passed up this opportunity to go underwater like that Jules Verne novel (though he could do with considerably less monsters in his life) he’d read, way back when.

Steve went everywhere with Tony, when he could, so it had been no surprise to Bucky that Steve had volunteered (or that Stark had accepted). Clint had begged to come along, though Bucky had no clue why and Nat, well, she was like Steve with Tony – going wherever Clint went unless something came up to prevent it.

Bucky had squashed down the jealousy, and resolved to just enjoy the trip. Nat was with Clint. He’d just have to deal.

But dealing with it, he wasn’t. Not really. His grip on his jealousy over Nat and Clint’s relationship was tenuous at best on a good day, and this hadn’t been a good _week._

The dreams had started the first night after they’d docked. Formless, vague things he couldn’t remember in the morning, but had him waking up shaking, covered in sweat and checking to make sure the walls weren’t closing in on him.

A sub was awesome. A sub cramped enough, the ocean cold enough, to remind him of his cryochamber? Bucky shuddered. That’s probably why the dreams had started up. He was no stranger to nightmares, but he’d been getting better until, well, _this._ Until his past traumas had reared their ugly heads, like HYDRA.

It would do nobody any good for him to bring it up now. He’d just… deal with it.

So Bucky kept his trap shut, not wishing for sympathies or puppy dog eyes or to cut the trip short. He wasn’t sure why they were spending so long down here anyway, when it should have been an easy set up and go, but well… Tony was Tony, and he kept muttering to himself and checking things and generally looking all around confused about _something_ , and stay they had.

At least it wasn’t entirely barren. Clint had found a small garden in the lower decks, filled with artificial sunlight and plants just starting to sprout. When they weren’t off exploring the station, Bucky found himself there, with Clint, sometimes dozing, sometimes talking.

By the end of their week, though, Bucky was ready to head back, the novelty of everything having rubbed away and the dreams having only gotten worse, filled with a sense of dread, of blood, of staring blue eyes and spikey blond hair.

They didn’t mean anything, he knew it, but it was keeping him awake, unable to sleep, unable to relax. He may need less sleep than a normal human, but he still _needed_ it to function and Bucky… couldn’t.

Now all he really wanted was to find Clint and get the fuck outta here.

* * *

Clint had been led into a chamber, amazingly spacious, actually, and then sealed inside. He waited, at first, for someone to come back. Maybe with some universal translator or something. And then he’d gotten bored.

At first, he floated lazily, then he began to explore, looking for another way out, or a way forward. After ages upon ages of searching, he found something near the bottom of the chamber, almost more of a crevice in the wall than anything else. A shelf had overshadowed it but Clint was Hawkeye for a reason. It was tiny though, far too tiny for the merfolk he’d seen so far, and maybe it was a way out.

Did he risk it? What if he left, and he couldn’t _breathe_ anymore? He still wasn’t sure how he was to begin with. Then again, did he dare sit and wait for some unknown fate? The team was sure to think he was dead, so rescue wouldn’t be an option.

Before he could think better of it, Clint found himself wedging into the tiny space. It was a tight fit, and he was scraping almost painfully as he went, but he’d been in worse spots before.

Eventually, the crevice widened into a proper tunnel and he floated along with an occasional kick. It was surprisingly lit up, bits of moss or something that glowed growing over the rock walls. Whatever it was, Clint was thankful for it.

Despite how far he’d gone, he could still breathe, so that was a plus. And strangely, the further he traveled along the tunnel, the warmer it became. There was _no way_ that was going to come back and bite him in the ass somehow, right?

The tunnel seemed to go on forever, until it didn’t, ending abruptly. Before Cint could stop his forward motion - practically drawn out of it as helplessly as he’d been drawn along the current from the station after the explosion - he tumbled out of it into a wide-open space, darkness all around him. The water around him seemed to _breathe_ – and that was a thought he really wished he hadn’t had – as he bobbed up and down like he was caught in a wave.

It was also getting almost uncomfortably warm.

Yeeeaah…

This was bad, wasn’t it?

Clint looked around, but the helpful light along the tunnel didn’t seem to extend much further than the tunnel mouth. At least he’d be able to find his way back to _that_ again should he decide to go back. But the ominous thought that lighting had stopped because there was nothing for it to _grow_ on worried him. Anything could be out there in the darkness of the ocean, especially at such depths as they were, unless that tunnel had been angling up – though he was relatively certain that it hadn’t been. Hawkeye had a pretty unerring sense of direction, honed by years of circus work and working with the aerialists on occasion – something he’d kept up for fieldwork. It had come in handy more than once.

And all his trained instincts were saying he was just as deep as he’d been.

Maybe deeper.

Feeling naked without his bow and without his suit – either his Hawkeye suit _or_ the deep sea diving suit Tony had provided – Clint dug around in the pouches of his pants, belatedly taking stock of what he might have on his person. A now water logged deck of cards, a pack of gum, some twists of snapped bowstrings he tended to fiddle with, a chocolate bar and – ah yes, a multitool with a teeny tiny flashlight on it.

And not just _any_ multitool. It was a SHIELD issued one that Tony had modified. Which meant there was a flashlight on it – more powerful than a tiny flashlight had any right of being. But, well, Tony.

Clint flicked it on and slowly scanned his surroundings.

And promptly swallowed a not so manly scream.

* * *

Nat hovered over Stark as he worked the controls of the little sub, Bucky paced the all too tiny space and Steve attempted to divide his attention between staying informed with Stark and talking Bucky down.

Bucky should feel guilty about that, but he was too fuckin worried about Clint. None of this made sense but then… the world had stopped making sense right around the 1940’s, so… this wasn’t news.

It was, however, very frustrating.

“Tony,” Steve’s voice, spoken slowly and with a tone that had Bucky jerking his head up in an instant. “Please tell me you see that _wall_ right out front? You know, the one we seem to be heading towards at top speed?”

“My eyes do, but my scans say there’s nothing there.” Tony’s voice was completely unconcerned. “And I’d trust science and my tech over fallible humans any day.”

“And your tech _never_ breaks down,” Steve said flatly.

“I’m telling you, Cap,” Tony said, not looking up from his instruments once, flicking switches and readouts alike. “Once I got a good look at Wakandan tech, I calibrated for TARDIS technology.”

“Who says they gave you a _good_ look?” Steve asked, skipping right past the reference that had gone right over Bucky’s head. Probably Steve’s too. Normally they’d needle Tony about it, but now...

Bucky strode forward, edging past Steve to get a good look over Tony’s shoulder. Steve was right. That underwater cliff was looming alarmingly close.

“Are you sure that’s where Clint went?” Bucky asked, his voice gruff with pent up feelings.

“Absolutely.” Tony spoke with such confidence that it made you want to believe.

“Can we at least slow down and look for a proper entrance?” Steve asked.

“Why? I can just make one. If we need to. And I’m saying we don’t.” Tony sighed. “Look, if it makes you feel any better – “ he reached out and hands moved like lightning, a frown slowly growing on his face as the ever present hum of the subs engines died.

They kept moving forward at a clip much faster than Bucky would like.

“Tony?” Steve pushed.

“Uh…” Tony said, his hands moving – if possible, even faster now. “We’re not stopping. I cut the engines. Now trying reverse thrusts –“

The sub kept moving forward and was, if anything, picking up speed.

“Shit, shit, shit. I think we’re caught in some kind of a current. It’s strong, too.”

“Brace for impact,” Nat called, slipping her helmet on. Tony frowned at her, hurt flashing in his eyes, but he also put his helmet on, the nanotech forming around his face seamlessly. Bucky snapped his in place, watching Steve do the same. The wall grew closer and closer and then –

They passed right through it. Steve exhaled in relief and Tony visibly brightened, his helmet retracting to allow everyone to see the wide grin beaming from his face. “Told you so,” he said happily.

“Oh my god,” Nat breathed, and Tony’s head whipped back around even Bucky and Steve stepped even closer to the window. “It’s beautiful.”

“An underwater _city_ ,” Steve said in a reverent tone. “It’s gorgeous. Hey, Buck, you ever read anything like this in those pulp novels? Jesus.”

Bucky nearly growled. Steve was looking at the vista spread before them like he wished he had his sketchbook in his hands, like it wasn’t some potentially dangerous thing ready to kill them all.

They didn’t _really_ know if Clint was alive, after all, or why the folk that lived here had taken him.

Beauty did not mean good.

“Can it, Steve. This pretty little picture is likely responsible for almost killing Clint and abducting him.”

Steve shot him a sympathetic look but leaned in close over Tony’s shoulders. Tony, as hyper aware as he normally was, never seemed to care how close Steve got, how invasive he was of Tony’s personal space. If it were any other time, Bucky might tease them about that, but there were more important matters right now.

They had to get Clint back.

He swallowed, hard, brushing a hand over his face for a brief second before attempting to compose himself. A hand, delicate and strong, touched his shoulder briefly, a quick squeeze and gone again.

“We’ll get him back. Clint’s like a penny – always turning up.”

“Heads up, looks like we’ve got an escort,” Steve said, cutting in. Bucky and Nat turned to stare at the window, out at the swimming figures – a shifting mass of bright and dull colors and patterns, of fins and arms and… tentacles?

“We’re still powered down, which means we’re going where _they_ want us to go,” Tony pointed out.

“Is that a good idea?” Steve asked. Bucky almost snorted. Steve never did like anyone telling him what to do and where to go. He hated someone else having control of his destiny. To be fair, Bucky got it, but Steve was ornery over the weirdest things sometimes.

“Maybe not,” Tony acceded. “But they must know something which means it might be our best shot at getting information.”

Steve looked like he wanted to argue, full team leader ‘protect the rest of the team’ mode about to engage – but he took one look at Bucky and whatever he saw there, Steve deflated and nodded. “Fine, but everyone, stay on your guard.”

* * *

So it turned out that maybe staying where he’d been put had been a good idea. Who knew? If only he had.

Clint wriggled about, trying to head back to the tunnel mouth before the consequences of his actions caught up to him. A leathery tentacle slid around his waist and pulled, hard, telling him it was far too late for that.

This was it. This was how it ended. The Deep Sea was finally getting its revenge for all that Calamari he’d eaten.

Still, Clint wasn’t going down without a fight. Pulling a blade form his boot – hey, it was a comfort thing. And it wasn’t like he went around with 20 of ‘em the way Nat or Bucky did at times, and besides that it was coming in handy now, wasn’t it? – he hacked at the tentacle, hoping to get free long enough to, well, get free.

There was no way he, a normal human, in a completely unfamiliar environment, could battle an underwater behemoth with nothing more than a knife. But get away? Sure. Unless this thing was hungry enough to try breaking walls of rock just to get at Clint, but Clint was willing to stake his life on the idea that he might be more trouble than that was worth if he could just get back under cover again.

After all, there was nothing to lose if he was wrong. If he was wrong, then he’d be dead either way, but if he was _right…_

Frantically, he sawed at the tentacle, but it was thick and leathery and resistant. If only he had one of the Wakandan blades, this might not be so hard. And the entire time, Clint was being drawn closer and closer, the flashlight from his multitool was swinging wildly about from where it was now clipped to his belt, creating a strobe affect that he could do quite well without, thank you very much.

Clint’s life, the horror movie.

And then a brighter light flashed past him - blue white and so, so familiar – and there was an inhuman shriek when it struck into the darkness, briefly lighting up the water. Crackles of energy washed over Clint as the tentacle loosened and he kicked off violently, lurching away at less speed then he wished to, impeded by the density of the water.

Something latched onto him and Clint struck out. There was a grunt and then a hiss in his ear. “Just me, Barton.”

Holy fuck!

“Bucky?” Clint asked incredulously. The idea that he could talk without choking on water hadn’t even occurred to him, despite the fact that he’d been _breathing_ it just fine. There wasn’t even any distortion to the words. Coms had gone down, but score one for the durability of Stark Tech aids, right?

“Yeah, you didn’t think Nat would let you get kidnapped without reading you the riot act, did you?” Bucky said with a smirk, but there was a tightness around his eyes that made Clint wish he could smooth it away.

“I’m fine!” Clint protested. “I got away!”

Bucky shook his head. “Doll, if that’s what you call getting away – “ Bucky closed his eyes and took a deep breath and Clint couldn’t help staring, couldn’t help expecting bubbles to be coming out of his mouth. “You scared the shit out of me,” Bucky said, his voice cracking.

“Me?” Clint asked incredulously.

“Yes, you,” Bucky said, his grip on Clint’s arms almost too tight. “I’m sorry, I know you’re with Nat, but I love you. I can’t help it, but I am. If we make it out of this, I won’t make it weird, I promise, but I thought you were _dead_ , Clint, and you gotta promise me to be more careful. I promise, I won’t get between you two –“

“What?” Clint said, blinking rapidly, cutting off Bucky’s rambling. Bucky’s eyes went wide and he winced. “I’m not with Nat.” Clint said. “Why would you think that?”

“Why _wouldn’t_ I?”

“I mean, we were, once. But we decided we worked better without that romantic entanglement. We’re family. Only family she’s ever had, only family I’ve got left.”

“You’ve got us, Clint,” Bucky said. “Don’t you?”

“Yeah, but more importantly, did you say you loved me?”

“More _importantly_ ,” Tony said. “We’ve gotta fry up some Calamari. Get your heads back in the game, lovebirds.”

A tentacle whipped past them along with Tony’s words and Clint jerked backwards, jostling Bucky. They were surrounded by the things, only Steve and Tony keeping them from wrapping around Bucky and Clint in their ill-advised moment of confession.

Now was _not_ the time for this.

But Bucky still thought -

Clint opened his mouth but before he could say a word, Bucky tossed him towards the tunnel mouth with his metal arm easily, Clint’s body rocketing towards the cliff face with alarming speed. But Bucky’s aim was true, and Nat caught him, slowing his forward motion to something more controllable before he could collide with anything and the two of them retreated inside.

“What’s going on?” Clint asked, twisting about. He grabbed a wall and leaned out, searching for light, for movement. As he stared out into the cavern, now lit up with every strike Tony made, the Cavern shook under his hand and the same inhuman shriek came again, and again, echoing through the water weirdly.

With each stream of light, Clint could see Steve, Tony and Bucky fighting a… a giant _Squid?_ Was that what had grabbed him? Well, that explained the tentacles, at least.

At their sides were at least half a dozen merpeople of various types, wielding tridents that crackled with some sort of energy that helped Clint track them, despite how swiftly and fluidly they cut through the water.

He shook his head. He had to be dreaming, right? There was no way this was actually happening. As unbelievable as the rest of his life had become after joining the Avenges – hell, after that mission with SHIELD when Thor first arrived and Loki went on a rampage – this was just a step too far, right?

Nat pulled him back from the opening. “Don’t be an idiot,” she said. “There’s no way _either_ of us should be getting in the middle of that.”

“We’ve taken out worse –“

“And how well do _you_ move in the water?” she asked.

Clint had to give her that one, as he watched the merpeople gliding about like a hot knife through butter, like the water didn’t even resist them. Tony’s suit had enough thrust and control not to worry about it and Steve and Bucky – well, they were enhanced. They moved more clumsily, more slowly than the others, but they _could_ move, and do it well, where Clint had struggled to turn and swim away.

He was only human. And so was Nat. And if _he_ didn’t want her out there, he could hardly blame her for feeling the same about him.

But to just stay back and do _nothing?_

“I’m not a damsel in distress,” Clint muttered. “Neither are you. There’s gotta be _something_ we can do.” The uncertainty in his words came through a lot clearer than he wished and he winced at Nat’s sympathetic but understanding gaze.

“I know,” she said softly. “But not every fight requires the use of the variety of skills we have collected on our team. To each fight, the proper weapons. Another time it’ll be me and you while Tony is forced to sit on the sidelines because he’s too flashy.”

Clint snorted. Tony would hate that but, as usual, Nat was right.

Anxiously, Clint watched the battle, wincing every time a tentacle got too close to anybody - but especially Bucky – and whenever anybody swam too close to an open maw. Nat touched her ear and Clint knew she was hearing the others on the comms and he wished his hadn’t fried. He clenched his fists as he watched, the battle dragging on and on and on.

Then Iron Man peeled off out of the fray and his suit went dark and Clint swore. Nat laid a hand on his shoulders.

“Tony’s laying depth charges. They’re buying him time. Come on. We need to get out of here before they go off.”

Clint shuddered. The last thing he wanted was to be trapped in an underwater cave, even if breathing was somehow not an issue, starvation and dehydration surely was. Not to mention the sheer loneliness of it, if he managed to get trapped by himself. He kicked off after Nat, the two of them pushing as fast as they could through the tunnel he’d originally come through. There had to have been another way in. There was no way Steve, Bucky, Tony or the merfolk had fit in this tunnel, but despite not being familiar with it, Nat led the way with no hesitation.

That meant the merfolk must have known of its existence and where it went, even if they never used it, and told the team. Clint wondered if they’d expected him to find it or use it if he had, but pushed the thought away to concentrate on pushing through the tunnel faster.

Where he’d been cautious on the way out, the other end a mystery, there were no such questions now. Before he knew it, he and Natasha were tumbling out of the tunnel into the large, cavernous room he’d originally been deposited in. It wasn’t so empty now, a few merfolk standing by – so to speak. Two of them swam over to them, pulling them further from the tunnel mouth.

Briefly, Clint wondered whether or not the merpeople were an issue, friend or foe, or what the situation was, really, but Nat was going along with them easily and the merfolk _had_ been fighting by the teams side, so Clint took his cue from her and them.

“You must not stay so close. If the beast chases you, its tentacles have been seen breaching the wall. It could very well reach you and pull you back into its maw,” one said, urging Clint along faster.

“You’ll get no argument from me,” Clint muttered. “Hey! I understood you! How’s that possible? Why didn’t anybody answer my questions before? I might not have gone towards certain death if you had.”

“Our apologies,” the second said, as they neared the other side of the room. “The spell to learn your language was incomplete at the time of your arrival and we did not think anyone could fit through so small an opening. We did not believe you to be in any danger if you only waited a short time.”

Clint flushed a little, but didn’t think anyone would notice. Well, okay, that was on him. Oops. But to be fair, it had been a damn good survival technique in the past, giving him an edge when the bad guys had – or thought they had – him.

An explosion rocked the cave, sending the water spiraling and pushing Clint and Nat into the knot of merpeople and towards the wall with tremendous force. If he had needed to worry about breathing actual air instead of water, he knew that the underwater shockwave would have caused other problems for him and Nat. Luckily, they skipped right past that and into the serious worry of bodily harm and head injuries as the shockwave knocked them about.

There were several others, each of a lesser intensity, before the explosions stopped. It took some time for the water to settle, and by then the rest of the team had joined them. Bucky, Clint noted, would be limping if he’d been walking. As it was, his left leg was kicking out oddly as he swam, though it didn’t seem to be slowing him down any as he headed straight for Clint.

Then he checked himself, as if –

Oh _hell_ no.

Clint launched himself at Bucky, pushing off the wall with his legs, barreling into Bucky and sending them tumbling over and over in the water, Clint clutching at Bucky’s suit.

“Clint? What the fuck –“ Bucky grunted upon impact.

“I love you, too,” Clint said, grinning like a loon. Bucky went near limp in his grip.

“What?”

“Hey, I’ve got the hearing aids here, you’ve got enhanced hearing. I know you heard me,” Clint said, still grinning giddily. “Now what are you going to do about it?”

Bucky blinked at Clint as they both still floated in the water, slowly losing momentum and spin, but Clint focused on Bucky’s face, watching every little twitch of muscle, the shift in his eyes as he realized what Clint was saying and then the shock was changing to an almost smirk, something suave, confident, and all manner of hot – as if he weren’t hot enough already. Bucky’s lips quirked up.

“I’m gonna kiss you. _That’s_ what I’m gonna do about it,” Bucky said with a lazy, drawl, thick with that old New York accent you didn’t often hear much from him or Steve these days. Clint, he was pretty used to the accent, having lived in New York as long as he had, but when it was Bucky’s voice purring out the words, in that way, Clint about melted.

And he did, right there and then, his mouth covering Clint’s softly, reverently, before their lips parted and tongues teased along open mouths, teeth grazing and pulling gently.

The world around them, magnificent strange world as it was, was forgotten while they kissed. Their audience, the battle, all of it, rushing clean out of their heads until all that was left was them, this, their kiss, hands clutching on to each other as if afraid to let go.

And maybe they were. Their lives were dangerous and even for people as supposedly as unkillable as Bucky and Steve were, who knew what dangers were out there?

Certainly Clint would never have believed that _merpeople_ existed before this.

But for this moment, this one perfect moment, none of that mattered.

Okay, and this perfect moment, too.

And that one.

Well, there’d be a lot of them in the future, Clint was sure. No way he was letting Bucky Barnes out of his hands now that he finally had him. He was an idiot, but not _that_ much of an idiot, thanks Nat.

“Oh, c’mon! You two gotta breathe _sometime!”_ Tony shouted.

Without breaking their kiss, Bucky and Clint flipped him off, in unison. Tony spluttered and Steve steered him away, leaving Bucky and Clint to themselves, Nat giving a last, approving nod before following after them.

“Nat, really?” Clint asked when they were at last alone.

Bucky blushed. “Shut up.”

Clint grinned. “Okay.”

He proceeded to do just that. Bucky, very enthusiastically, helped.

**Author's Note:**

> Information Clint never gets:
> 
> merpeople kidnapped him to draw out the others after SomethingTM being done at the station woke up the monster/let it out of it's den or whatever (i didn't flesh that bit out too much). Think Evie from the Mummy saying "I woke him up, I intend to stop him." only the merfolk are saying "You did this. Now. Fix it." 
> 
> Of course, they're not helpless either (they were right there in the battle too!), they got magic and shit, but what they really needed was to make contact with humans and say "Don't keep doing this shit, this is what happens when you do." and get the humans to understand the consequences of their actions.
> 
> They did try sending dreams as a communications effort but it didn't go well, because everyone just thought it was a nightmare born of having literally fought aliens in the past and all other manner of crazy things, and then being underwater putting a new context to their nightmares.


End file.
